


An Angel With Wax Wings

by chaoticaristocrat



Category: Angel Beats!, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Afterlife, Angst, Backstory, Canon-Typical Violence, College (Kind Of), Death, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Flashbacks, Guns, M/M, Panic Attacks, Pararibulitis (Dirk Gently), Slow Burn, powers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-30
Packaged: 2019-02-10 20:15:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12919446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chaoticaristocrat/pseuds/chaoticaristocrat
Summary: '“Look. You’re dead. Get over it quickly, because you’re going to have to get used it it.”'Holy shit', he thinks, completely speechless in the face of the woman, 'she’s absolutely insane'. He inches slightly away, half in his mind to just lie back down on the dusty ground. This had to be a dream. No one can be that crazy, right? 'She thinks this is the afterlife'.'Todd wakes up, memory-less, on a dusty road, in front of a woman with a gun.Angel Beats! AU





	1. definitely not dead

**Author's Note:**

> So this concept kind of got stuck in my head one day, and I couldn't get rid of it, so I thought I'd write it and hopefully give the idea some justice.
> 
> You don't have to know anything about Angel Beats! to read this, most of it should hopefully be explained pretty thoroughly. But a quick explanation of the setting is that when people die, they wake up in a high school where they have to learn to move on. In the afterlife, you can get injured and die, but it only lasts a couple minutes before you wake up perfectly fine again - even though it still hurts like hell. In this case, I changed the setting to more of a college, which makes me not fudging people's ages a bit more believable. 
> 
> And that's about it, without any spoilers! I'm not going to be following the plot of the anime anywhere near exactly, but it'll follow the general concept of it. I also have an addition where everyone has a specialty, similar to a power, that they learn in the afterlife - it fits along the lines of both the canons, so I thought it'd be fun! 
> 
> Updates are going to be pretty sporadic for the moment - I'll try to update semi-frequently, but I can't make any promises that it'll be regular. 
> 
> Anyways, this is pretty much my first fic - my only other one is for a video game and I'm not sure I'm ever going to get past the one chapter. So comments and criticism is definitely welcome! I know my writing isn't perfect and the characterization is probably off, but I hope it's at least enjoyable to read!

There is nothing but darkness. It swims behind his eyelids and makes his head spin. He knows he is a person, a man, but he can’t bring himself to recall anything else or else the spinning gets worse, rocketing his pitch-black world into nausea.

Something cold and hard is digging incessantly into his spine.

He wakes up. His eyelids flash open.

Immediately he squints, the moon unusually large and bright in the sky above him. It takes him a moment, but he realizes that he is lying spread-eagled on some sort of road. There is a rock below him, which explains the sharp bruise he can feel forming along his back. He sits up, dust falling from his shoulders and back as though he has been there for a very long time. He doesn’t remember lying down, but he's there, so he must have done so at some point.

A flash of moonlight in front of him catches his gaze, and he stares, eyes widening as he identifies what the woman in front of him is holding. Her dark hair curls wildly above her brows and her eyes, set on something far below them, glint with something steely. Her hands clench comfortably around a sniper rifle as though she was born holding it.

He sputters. “I- what the hell?”

The woman turns her sharp gaze on him, making him flinch. The eye roll that follows is surprising, but immediately endears him to her. 

“Don’t interrupt me. This is an extremely important mission for the-” She turns, her face morphing into something mildly exasperated, as she talks into the radio on her shoulder. “What were we calling it again now?” 

“The Not-Dead-Yet Battlefront.” The answer crackles from her jacket, inciting another eye roll. She is dressed in all black, the detail helping her to blend into the velvety night sky behind her. She doesn’t bother responding to the radio, instead focusing her attention back to the scope of the rifle. “Also, Farah, we’re supposed to welcome the newcomer, not sca-”

A swift hand silences the thing, and the woman -Farah- shoots a glare at him, as though it’s his fault that the person on the other end was interrupting her concentration. She squeezes the trigger, once, and a quiet ‘pop!’ that sounds nothing like a true gunshot goes off. 

“Damn.” She swears under her breath, lifting her eyes above the scope for a moment before dipping back down and readying her fingers for another shot. 

It encourages him to look down, and he is alarmed to see what she is looking at. A man, standing alone in the centre of a large field, a bright yellow jacket and dark red pants making him stand out more than the fact that he is the only person in the area. The ground around him glitters in the moonlight, littered with bullets and holes. He watches, almost in slow motion, as her fingers move to fire again. 

“What the- no, what the fuck are you doing?” He launches himself to his feet, firmly pressing a hand into the rifle and throwing off her aim. The barrel is uncomfortable hot under his fingertips. If he’s honest to himself, he had no idea where this bravery came from - he just knows he doesn’t want to watch someone’s brains explode all over the grass below them.

“You don’t understand.” The woman seems steady, although her fingers are twitching slightly above the trigger. “Don’t worry, you will soon enough.” Regardless of her words, she sighs and lifts the sights from the man below them, instead turning fully to face him.

“Look-” The only thing that betrays her nervousness is the fluttering of her fingertips over the gun, muscle memory guiding her through checking each and every part as she speaks. “You’re dead. Get over it quickly, because you’re going to have to get used it it.” She swears under her breath, and he leans forward slightly to catch what she’s muttering.

“-that blunt, Ken is so much better at this, hell, even Tina- no, Farah, you can do this. Come on.”

Her gaze softens slightly. A glance over her shoulder betrays that she hasn’t completely forgotten about the man she was shooting at. “You’re dead, and this is the afterlife. Every second here, you’re in danger of disappearing. We call it Obliteration. The only way to keep yourself from getting Obliterated is joining up with us. That man,” she jabs over her shoulder with a thumb, “is one of our enemies - part of Project Whitewing. His name is Icarus.”

_ Holy shit, _ he thinks, completely speechless in the face of the woman,  _ she’s absolutely insane _ . He inches slightly away, half in his mind to just lie back down on the dusty ground.  _ This had to be a dream _ . No one can be  _ that _ crazy, right?  _ She thinks this is the  _ afterlife _. _

Seemingly done with her explanation, Farah lifts the rifle once again. He makes a split-second decision and takes a step down the stairs. “No offence, but I’m just gonna…” He darts, not bothering to finish his sentence before he sprints down the stairs towards the man. If this is a dream, he may as well do something crazy too. He could swear he heard an irritated sigh behind him as he runs.

He’s out of breath when he makes it to the bottom, but he’s there, in front of the man. Now that he’s closer, he can see that the grass around him is indeed peppered with bullets, but the man seems unfazed. In fact, he even grins.

“Hiii!” The man waves awkwardly, yellow jacket swaying slightly to reveal a tie patterned with tiny ice cream cones. Oddly enough, his accent marks him as British.

His mouth gapes open a little at the reaction, and he feels his eye start to twitch.“You realize she’s shooting at you, right? Are you insane?” His voice is an octave higher than usual, a bellow that echoes across the relatively empty field.

The man furrows his brows, looking more concerned about the loudness than the fact that he almost died about sixty times in the last couple minutes, by the look of it. 

He rubs a hand over his eyes, closing them against the growing realization that this absolutely cannot be real. Is everyone in this dream going to give him a headache?

“Oh, you’re here about that? They do that all the time. I don’t mind too much, though I rather wish they didn’t. It’s not like I can die. It hurts like hell when they hit me, though.” The yellow man is surprisingly solemn sounding, at least until he opens his eyes and the goofy grin is still plastered stoically on the man's face. 

“For fuck’s sake! Just wake up!” He gives up on trying to make sense of this, instead pinching his arm, slapping his forehead, and generally trying every possible way he knows to wake up from a dream. Finally, when he’s exhausted all his options, he looks back at the yellow jacketed man, his hands shaking slightly.

“Are you okay? This isn’t a dream - that's actually a common thought here, for newcomers - but you’re dead, like all of us. It’s really quite unfortunate, though I don’t find I mind all that much - after all, once you’re dead, you can’t die again, and that’s rather convenient, isn’t it?” Yellow jacket pats his arm in a way he seems to think is comforting, morphing his face into something that looks like a poor attempt at concern. 

“Fucking hell- alright, fine, if I’m dead, and this isn’t a dream, I shouldn’t be able to die, right? So just- I don’t fucking know, kill me!” 

The man’s face changes into something even more concerned, but he lifts his arm nonetheless. His lip trembles slightly. “I- no, I don’t do that… I don’t kill people, I don't 'Obliterate’ them, I  _ help _ them, you see, I'm a detective and I... and I don’t know who told yo-”

Something hot and painful burns through the back of his skull, cutting off all sound - including interrupting the yellow jacketed man before he can finish. He blinks, once, twice, and watches through half shuttered eyes as the man’s eyes grow as large as saucers, something red and wet splattering on his coat. He realizes far too late that it’s his blood. He sinks to his knees, the man in front of him blurring into multiple colours as he collapses, vision fading slowly before dropping all of his awareness sharply into nothingness once again. 


	2. the dead and the dying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'One thing he can conclude is that this isn't a dream. No dream in his life has lasted this long, been this insane. For fuck’s sake, he’s died twice since it started. Whether he likes it or not, he's here, and he apparently can't die - since he should have. Twice.'
> 
> Todd wakes up again, shockingly alive. In some sense of the word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there! I'm glad to see there's been at least a little interest in this little story since I posted the first chapter.
> 
> Sorry about the delay - there was a little detail in this that I was hoping would be resolved by episode 9, but since it wasn't I just decided to post it as is.
> 
> Content warning in this chapter for a mild description of a panic attack, drowning, and death. 
> 
> As always, comments and criticism are very welcome!

When he awakens again, he remembers that his name is Todd. 

And now that he remembers that, he can’t believe how he could have forgotten. There's no way he'd actually forget his own name, right? That’s an impossibility, it doesn’t  _ actually _ happen. At least not outside of dreams.

He can feel sunlight warming his face, turning the backs of his eyelids a burning red colour, but keeps his eyes closed this time. He begins to count down the reasons in his head why the insanity last night had to be a dream.

  1. There is no possible way he could forget his name.



He doesn't think too hard on that one, willing to remain willfully ignorant on why he can't seem to recall anything else. He's sure it's just grogginess left over from the- no wait, he's remaining ignorant, he isn't even  _ thinking _ about it. Because of course he remembers his name, and everything else too.

  1. He is currently alive, and yet he absolutely got shot through the skull.



Not that he's ever been shot before, at least from what Todd can recall, but he can't imagine anything else that the sudden pain that had blossomed through his skull could have been. Either way, if it wasn’t a dream, he'd be dead, not listing reasons why it absolutely  _ was _ a dream.

  1. That woman had a gun, and he's pretty sure it's a model that’s illegal in all 50 states.



That is, Todd’s _absolutely_ _sure_ he knows nothing about guns, because he remembers _everything, definitely_ , but he’d be seriously fearing for his health and sanity if _sniper rifles_ were on the list of guns that people could just run around with. 

  1. Any man with an ice cream tie, yellow jacket, and red pants who seemed entirely unfazed by being shot towards at least fifty times could not possibly be real.



Todd ran out of reasons after four, so he opened his eyes. 

It’s too bright in his room, and he squints, the sunlight filtering through the windows falling directly on his eyes. Instinctively, he reaches for the back of his head, relieved and  _ entirely unsurprised, thank you very much  _ to find it completely intact. 

His hand stills, however, when it reaches something cold and wet, dampening his hair and coating his fingertips. Heart in his throat, Todd lifts the his fingers to his eyes and a somewhat involuntary gasp leaves his lips in a rush when he sees the colour staining the tips.

Red. There's blood on his fingers, the back of his head, likely ruining the pillow below him. He sits up, ramrod straight and suddenly entirely awake, and realized that this is not his bedroom as he initially thought.

It’s a barebones hospital room, nothing but a scratchy bed, a mirror, and a couple of chairs placed haphazardly around the room. No medical materials, not even a fucking first aid kit - just a bed and chairs. Not at all equipped for actually helping people, but enough for a room to store someone who’s already dead.

His breathing is coming fast and harsh now, tearing out of his lungs like some sort of wild animal. Todd’s eyes dart around the room, to his bloodstained jacket and the carefully folded pile of the rest of his clothes. A headache is spiraling from the depths of his skull now that he's awake and sitting up, ripping through his brain like the bullet from the night before.

Todd can feel himself getting dizzy, his short breaths insufficient to deliver the much needed oxygen to his brain. He glances to the minimalistic mirror, horror dawning over him as he watched his lips fade from pink to a light purple, slowly phasing into blue from the lack of air. The breaths no longer feel necessary and life-saving, suddenly filling his lungs with water rather than refreshing air. 

He chokes, slipping from the bed and falling to the ground with a horribly familiar sensation. Todd tries desperately to breathe through the ocean filling his chest, hands fumbling along his body, instinctively in search of something he can't find, something he doesn’t even remember. He doesn’t know what he’s scrambling for, but his panicked mind searches desperately regardless. 

Blessedly, after what feels like hours, he passes out, doomed to drown on the polished floor of an entirely dry hospital room.

 

Todd’s breath comes in all at once, eyes flicking open to see the dappled hospital room ceiling above him. The fluorescent lights burn his eyes, clashing with the soft orange that seeps through the windows. He's been unconscious so long that the sun is setting, almost an entire day having passed since he woke up with no memory the night before.

The thought wakes Todd up to full alertness almost immediately. He drags himself to his feet, his head aching just as much as it did before he passed out. Rubbing his temples, he retrieves his relatively unscathed undershirt and pants from the nearby chair and pulls them on. Todd slips silently into the hallway, he desperately trying to make logical sense of his situation while his mind is whirring with emotions. 

One thing he can conclude is that this isn't a dream. No dream in his life has lasted this long, been this insane. For fuck’s sake, he’s died twice since it started. Whether he likes it or not, he's here, and he apparently can't die - since he should have. Twice. Lost in thought, he barely notices the other person blocking his path until he runs headlong into their faux-leather jacket. 

A concerned face framed with auburn hair looks down on him. “Are you okay? That was a pretty nasty shot. I've been looking all over for you, but honestly this place is a maze - even with a semi-decent grasp of the concept it'd be impossible to make it to class on time.” The man purses his lips, eyes unfocused as his thoughts seem to spiral into considerations on the concepts of time and space.

Todd gapes, before backing away as quickly as he dares. Last time he interacted with this man - Icarus, that was what Farah, the woman with the gun, had called him - he got shot through the back of the skull. It may not have been Icarus' fault, but nonetheless, Todd isn't too eager to repeat the experience. 

Icarus frowns, sombre realization dawning on his face as he takes a half step forward in an aborted attempt to stop Todd. “I- I'm sorry, I truly am, about B- I mean, Marzanna. You asked for proof you were dead, you even asked to die, so she kind of took it as an invitation. She tends to do that - kill people, that is. I think she did it when she was alive too, but at least now they don't stay dead for long.” The man makes a pained and somewhat embarrassed expression, as though this Marzanna is a mildly annoying little sister that he's in charge of.

He pauses, looking Todd in the eyes. Todd’s head hurts, and despite the fact that something in him is telling him that this man is not the enemy, he turns away. He can't be assed to try to untangle the lines of who he can trust in this insane place right now. Through the corners of his eyes he can see the man’s face close off, his hand pulled back awkwardly from where it had evidently darted back to catch hold of Todd’s sleeve. 

Todd walks away, forcing himself to not look back. After some randomly chosen twists and turns in case of a possibly-good-intentioned stalker, he finally turns to face the first room he finds that seems unlocked. A glance at the sign shows that it's the dean’s office. Belatedly, he realizes that that means this has to be some sort of college campus. Somehow, it took him until this moment to process that he was at a school, complete with classrooms, deans, and sprawling grounds that reached to the edge of the horizon.He recalls Icarus’ words before, about making it to class on time. For a brief moment, Todd was struck with a sudden and irrational desire to take off running in one direction and never stop, not until he found the real world again. 

He takes a deep breath, trying to calm his jumping heart, before placing a hand the doorknob and pushing forwards into the room. A mechanical sort of clicking sounds behind him as he does so, but he ignores it, determined to see another living soul that isn’t an insane woman with a gun and a somehow crazier man in a yellow leather jacket. He manages to get a glimpse of a small group of people before something lodges itself firmly through his spine. 

Todd glances down and almost passes out at the sight of the spearhead jutting out of his chest. Vision pulsing slightly at the edges, he collapses to the ground, gurgling as the movement jostles the weapon and sends another wave of pain ripping through his body. 

He lies there as his vision fades, each breath an unbearable agony until he finally slips away into complete and total darkness.

 

This time, when Todd wakes up, he’s not surprised to see an unfamiliar ceiling above him, nor shocked by the uncomfortable feeling of wetness in the centre of his chest, back, and his shirt. However, he is mildly taken aback by the feeling of something soft beneath him, expecting himself to have come to on the floor outside the dean’s office or even on the uncomfortable hospital bed from before.

A voice starts up nearby, and Todd automatically forces his breathing into something natural, keeping his eyes shut and continuing to feign sleep.

“-arah, why do we need a plan? It’s fun to watch you take shots at Icarus, and it’s not like we’re all about to get Obliterated here and now.” The voice is feminine and casual, coming from somewhere to his right. “Also, I  _ hate _ the Not-Yet-Dead Battlefront, why can't we go back to Afterlife Battlefront? Or Underworld Battlefront, that one was neat.”

“Tina. You know why.” The tight and exasperated voice definitely belonged to the woman from the night before, Farah. Todd’s smooth breathing caught for a second when he remembered watching her, serious and deadly, shooting at the man in the yellow jacket. Telling him he was dead and he’d better get over it quickly. The only way to survive was to join up with “us” - he assumed the aforementioned us was the people in the room, of which there seemed to be many, if Todd’s ears were to be believed.

Everything fell silent, and Todd almost held his breath, but instead he forced it into something that was a fair approximation of sleep again. He thought he’d gotten away with it too, up until someone kicked the couch he was on and made him jump, eyes snapping open.

A blonde woman with wild hair stood above him, a grin on her face. “Hey, you were right! Newbie’s awake.” This was obviously the Tina who had been talking before.

Todd sat up reluctantly, eyes flickering around the room and surveying each person.

By his quick count, there was about ten people in the room, including Tina and Farah. Five of them had commandeered the other couch, lounging over it like they owned it. Wads of stuffing poked out of the ripped fabric of the couch, and each member lorded over it like they owned the place. They looked like a pack of wolves, bristling with metallic objects and black clothing. 

Farah sat at a desk near the head of the room, and next to her stood another man with dark hair who was tapping away at a tablet in his hand. No one seemed all that perturbed by Tina’s announcement, instead continuing whatever they were doing before the unnatural pause in the conversation.

A man in odd clothes with pink hair lounged in the corner, his gaze sharp and observant. Beside him, a bearded man sat on a table, smiling softly. 

Todd cleared his throat awkwardly, waiting for someone else to talk. When no one did, he pinned Farah with his gaze, eyes narrowed, a sudden and irrational sense of bravery overtaking his logical mind. “Who’s idea was it to rig your goddamn door with a fishing spear?”

There's a laugh and something that sounds suspiciously like a howl that echoes from the corner of five at his comment. Todd scowls. He doesn't even need Farah to answer - he can tell from the reaction that it was them.

Surprisingly, a small smile finds its way onto Farah’s face. She doesn’t even look angry at his outburst, even cocking an eyebrow as though impressed.  “As you've probably guessed, that was the Rowdy 3.”

Todd spins, raising his own brow. “There's five of them, isn't there?”

The only woman of the group scowls back at him, her face twisted into an expression of clearly mixed emotions. “Oh, shut up, math.” The men around her hoot and holler, high five-ing her and fist bumping each other. 

He turns back to Farah, the predatory expressions on 'The Rowdy 3’s faces making him vaguely uncomfortable for a reason he can't quite place. Farah wears a somewhat bemused expression on her own lips.

“Regardless of who did it, you need password to enter unscathed. Only those of us in the Battlefront know it.” 

Tina, who somehow crept closer to Todd during the exchange, nudges him in the ribs. “So, wha’d’ya say? You joining up?” 

It’s rather sudden, but fair, considering Farah had already asked the night before as well. Todd’s gaze searches the room around him, and he taps his foot a couple of times in contemplation. On the one hand, they're the only relatively sane group of people he’s seen - now that he's died three times in the last day, it's pretty easy to believe this is the afterlife and Farah wasn't lying. His only other option here is Icarus and the murderous Marzanna who apparently had a habit of shooting people in the head.

His mouth hardens into a thin line as he makes up his mind. He's answering Tina’s question, but he looks over her shoulder at Farah as he speaks. “Okay, I'll join your Battlefront. What's this mysterious password?”

Tina throws her hands in the air triumphantly and spins around to face Farah. Todd watches as her hands flutter over her desk, her mouth finally cracking into something like a small grin. She steps towards him, reaching out a hand to shake his. 

“There is no God, Angels, or Heaven. Welcome to the Not-Yet-Dead Battlefront,” She cuts off, eyes widening a little in realization. “Oh. What's your name?” 

Todd starts a little too as it dawns on him that it hadn't come up yet in conversation. “Todd. Last name, and past in general, pending.”

Farah's eyebrows knit together slightly, but she recovers relatively quickly. “Amnesia’s pretty common here, especially for anyone that had a traumatic death. Hopefully it comes back to you soon.” She pauses. “Welcome, then, Todd.  I'm Farah, Farah Black. I'm one of the leaders of this operation, usually in charge of weapons.”

“This here is Tina Tevetino.” She gestures to Tina, who winks and gives a thumbs up. “You'll figure it out at some point anyways, but up here, everyone’s got something special. Tina’s a tried and true empath, meaning she gets the general idea of people’s emotions if she cares enough.”

“Next we have Ken, my fellow leader. Like you, his mind’s a little cagey on the last name. He's in charge of  technology, anything you see us using here was likely created by him alone.” Ken smiles slightly and reaches out to shake Todd’s hand, letting him catch a glance at the tablet when he does so. The screen is full of what looks like a random assortment of letters and numbers, making Todd’s head spin even more. 

He wrenches his gaze away as Farah moves on to the next member. “The one in the corner who looks like he's constantly ready for battle is Panto Trost.” Panto turns his eyes to Todd, face mostly impassive. 

Tina pipes up now. “Don't ask about the hair, he  _ swears _ it’s natural. He's also deadly with pretty much any weapon, so I wouldn't cross him. Especially when he's holding something sharp and pointy.” At that, Panto’s face changes, scowling good-naturedly at the blonde woman. 

Tina continues without much pause. “Sherlock Hobbs, our resident do-gooder, is the one next to him.”

Sherlock hops off his table and takes a few steps forward to shake Todd’s hand, a smile softening his face once again. When they touch, he feels an odd sense of calm flow through him. “Howdy, Todd. Call me Hobbs. Welcome to the Afterlife. If you ever need something, don't be afraid to let me know - we’re all family here.”

Farah smiles softly again at Hobbs’ response. “Hobbs can very slightly influence the emotions of others when he’s touching them. It’s been quite useful for our goals so far..” Todd can't help it, he takes his hand back pretty quickly after that. He doesn't like the idea of someone else affecting his thoughts and feelings. Rubbing his wrist self-consciously and ignoring the mildly hurt look on Hobbs’ face, he turns back to Farah and silently urges her to continue.

Finally, she moves on again, gesturing to the group he knows as the Rowdy 3. “That's Martin, Gripps, Cross, and Vogel. The one currently giving me the middle finger is Amanda.” She gestures to each one in turn. Martin sits closest to the edge of the couch, almost protectively over the rest of the group. His skunk-like hair and the glasses perched on the end of his nose somehow make him all the more intimidating. Gripps has a dirty beanie perched precariously on the top of his head, and gestures violently with something vaguely brick-shaped in his right hand. Cross’s prominent eye tattoo makes his eyes look hollow and washed out, but something in his gaze reads almost feral. The last one, Vogel, looks young, like he could almost be high school age; he grins and rocks slightly when his name is mentioned, but nonetheless still gives off a vaguely dangerous vibe. 

Amanda’s the one that commented on the Rowdy 3’s name before. She looks vaguely familiar, and Todd curses his amnesia. She's probably similar to someone who’s face lurks just at the edges of his scrambled mind, their name on the tip of his tongue. Amanda glares at him and Farah, her hair tied up high and clearly dyed black. It hurts his head to look at her, so he turns back to Farah. 

“What can they do, then?” He frowns, realizing that she never mentioned it when she was introducing it.

Shockingly, she laughs at that. “Honestly, that's a tough one. They're great at smashing stuff, and when they do, the fear they cause is something they can…” Farah pauses, looking like she’s at a loss for words. “Feed on, I suppose?”

Vogel makes a smacking noise with his lips, and Todd shudders a little as he hears Gripps and Cross chorus a “Yummy”. 

Farah grimaces slightly. “It’s an invaluable distraction, and thankfully they tend to only use it on the Whitewings and NPCs.” 

The last word gives Todd pause. He recognizes it, knows the terminology. Non player characters. In this context, however, he's lost. “What- why- who are you calling NPCs?”

“That's everyone else - those that go along with Icarus’ plans, that participate in classes and events. But the main difference is that unlike PCs - that's us - the NPCs don't get Obliterated.” Ken jumps in this time, the first words he's spoken since Todd woke up.

Todd feels a bit faint. “Will they repeat themselves if I talk to them, like, on a loop?”

Ken laughs, a wonderfully honest sound. “No, they're pretty much just like you and me. Except they can't seem to be Obliterated, and we’re pretty sure they were never alive - there's no one back there. Nobody's home, lights out behind the curtains, so to speak.” He waves a hand in front of his eyes to demonstrate.

“That's just about the fifth time you've said that - Obliterated, what does it mean?” Todd asks. Every bit of information he learns about this place is making his head spin, but he can't help it. The word has a distinctly negative tone to it.

When he asks, the room seems to darken, a sombre note weighing heavily on everyone present. Vogel kicks his legs almost petulantly, like a child, and Farah’s lip shivers. Several moments of silence pass before Ken speaks again.

“As you’re well aware, we can't actually die here. We can be killed, and it hurts like hell, but you don't actually die, not in the same sense as in your past life. Instead, what you would consider dying in the real world is what we call Obliteration here. Its why we fight Icarus, and Marzanna - the Whitewings. They appear to be the cause of Obliteration, from what we can tell.”

“We don't know what happens when people are Obliterated. They're just gone, vanished, and we never see them again. There's no coming back from it. You're just gone, forever.”

“Completely, truly, dead, once and for all.”


	3. i got nothing left inside of my chest, but it's all alright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Not-Yet-Dead Battlefront commences their first operation since Todd joined up.
> 
> Todd finds some things out about himself, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "All Alright" by Fun.
> 
> Content warning in this chapter for death, minor manipulation, descriptions of blood/pain, and swearing.

Silence fell upon the room once more, somehow even more weighted than before. Todd himself was struck dumb by the revelation.

Somehow, in the couple hours since he realized he was dead, he'd gotten used to it. He supposed that dying three - or rather four, if he counted the one that brought him here - times in one day was more than enough to convince someone of their relative immortality. And yet here Ken was, telling Todd he wasn't safe - that while he could die over and over again and be physically, if not mentally fine, there was a new risk forming on the horizon. Obliteration.

He recalls with sudden clarity Icarus from the night before, frowning and insisting he doesn't kill people or Obliterate them. The first seemed to be true, what with his lackey Marzanna doing the dirty work. But the Battlefront was insisting that it was them, the so-called 'Whitewings’, who did it. They were the threat, the enemy, now.

Todd finds himself happier with each passing minute that he effectively ran from Icarus. Who knows what the man might have done, had he been allowed to continue to talk to Todd. Would he have Obliterated him, despite insisting he wouldn't? Or would he have somehow convinced Todd it was for the best, and gotten someone else to do the hard part, like he did with Marzanna. He feels vaguely betrayed, and dirty, the dishonesty making his skin itch.

Todd may not know a whole lot about himself right now, but he _knows_ , deep in his heart and his bones, that honesty is the most important value a person can uphold.

Tina is the one to break the silence. She clears her throat, only somewhat awkwardly, before speaking. “Uhh, anyways, on that note - I still think we should change the name. Not-Yet-Dead is so last week! Don't you agree, Hobbs?”

The man looks slightly taken aback at being addressed, but he just smiles and shrugs. “I don't mind what the name is, it's all the same to me.”

Farah frowns. “Afterlife Battlefront and Underworld Battlefront are both out - they make it sound like we’ve accepted our deaths, and are ready to-to be Obliterated.” She stutters slightly on the last couple of words, her voice somewhat hesitant. Nobody comments.

“What about the Rowdy Battlefront?” Someone from the Rowdy 3 suggests - Todd can't pick out who it was. The suggestion is met with a chorus of cheers from that half of the group, while the rest of them erupt into various groans and boos.

“I like the Anti-Whitewing Battlefront.” Panto pipes up, raising his eyebrows. “It keeps us focused on the enemy.” It’s the longest sentence that Todd has heard from the man, and he can tell from his expression that it's going to take a while before Panto comes close to trusting him.

They bicker back and forth for a couple minutes, Ken and Farah and even sometimes others jumping in to excitedly support or viciously tear down the suggestions of the others. It’s an easy back and forth, this, and Todd can feel himself getting warm and comfortable, let's himself sit on the couch not claimed by the Rowdy 3, sinking into the soft cushions and letting the voices wash over him.

He's almost been lulled back to sleep when something he can't even put a finger on jolts him back into the conversation, sudden and jarring.

“We-Wont-Be-Obliterated Fighter’s Guild.”

“Tina, we’ve been over this, it needs to have Battlefront.” Farah’s voice is clearly exasperated, but also fond.

Finally, Ken puts a hand up. “I give up, we’re going back to Afterlife Battlefront. It’s short, sweet, and to the point. If any of you think of something better, you can suggest it, but for now, this is it.”

Todd opens his eyes to see Farah frowning, her lip trembling slightly, but she keeps her mouth shut. Ken shoots her an unreadable look, before he taps something across his tablet that makes a large screen fire up behind the desk.

“Since we have a newbie, you all know what that means; it’s time for Operation: Catastrophe.”

The Rowdy 3 all whoop and howl at that, some of them even getting up and using whatever they can get their hands on to smash into the nearest furniture. Todd cringes as the youngest one destroys a glass vase, but everyone else seems relatively unfazed.

“Everyone here knows the drill. You’ll be reprising your roles from the last time, except Todd is joining Panto and Farah on guard duty.”

At this, nearly everyone nods and gets to their feet. Todd flinches and sputters.

“I- what, now? Isn’t it night?”

“Yes, exactly. The perfect time for this particular operation.” Ken grins, something almost vicious. “Todd, just follow Panto and Farah’s leads and you should be fine.”

 

Half and hour later, Todd finds himself outside the school auditorium, an ill-suited gun in his hands and some knuckledusters shoved hastily in the pocket of the hoodie he’d been unceremoniously handed on his way out of the Battlefront Headquarters. Both weapons were thanks to Farah, who looked him seriously in the eyes and warned him to stay safe before vanishing around the opposite side of the building.

If he squinted, Todd could just barely spot the telltale pink hair of Panto, poking very slightly around the next corner. They were spaced pretty evenly around the relatively large building, just within shouting distance. Panto and Farah both had radios, but when Todd had asked for one, Ken had just shrugged and tossed over his shoulder that they were out but he’d make one as soon as possible.

Meaning for now, shouting was about as good as it got for Todd. He roved his gaze aimlessly across the grounds outside of the auditorium, itching to do something slightly less boring. From where he stood he could hear electronic music humming from the interior. The Rowdy Three were supposedly getting into position before enacting their part of the plan; diversion.

Not a moment later, there was an echoing boom from deep within the building, followed by a howl and what sounded faintly like screaming. Todd started slightly, turning completely to look at the building as the sounds of chaos began.

When he turned back, there was suddenly a yellow-jacketed man only a couple feet away from him.

Todd flinched in surprise, unable to stop himself. His breath hitched in his throat but he managed to get words out with minimal stuttering. “Icarus. What a pleasant surprise.” He forced his tone to be as aggressive as he could make it when he’d so recently almost had a heart attack.

His fingers scrabbled lightly for purchase on the trigger as he levelled the gun at Icarus’ forehead with only slightly shaking hands. Todd darted his eyes towards where he’d last seen Panto, desperately hoping that the other man had noticed that the enemy was here. On their way to their positions, he’d watched everyone’s expressions darken with the discussion of Icarus and his partner, Marzanna. They had been the direct cause of countless painful deaths, let alone the only known reason for Obliterations.

Icarus’ mouth formed into a perfect ‘o’ as shock spread its way across his face. “Oh! Please don’t shoot me.” He put his hands up, tone entirely sincere.

Todd didn’t want to shoot anyone. Fuck it, he didn’t know _how_ to shoot anyone. Farah had thrown him rather abruptly directly into the thick of it. It was just his fucking luck that Icarus would show up where he was guarding.

Icarus’ expression changed to something contemplative after he realized he wasn’t necessarily in immediate danger. “I don’t think we’ve actually met properly.” He grinned, holding out a hand, palm out like he was offering some sort of truce. “I’m Dirk Gently, a holistic detective.”

Todd’s arms dropped of their own accord, surprise painting every inch of his body. “You’re Icarus.” He speaks slowly, as though Icarus - apparently ‘Dirk Gently’ - was the one confused.

The other man’s expression changed minutely to a frown. “Ah yes, they’re quite fond of that name here, aren’t they.” He looks like he’s about to say more, his expression darkening, when all of a sudden he gasps and lurches forward with a shout of “No!”

Todd registers the red dot on his sternum just a moment too late. He closes his eyes, expecting the unpleasant heat of a bullet ripping through his chest at any moment, too frozen by fear to do anything more than accept it. The shot rings out, but instead of pain tearing through his ribcage, he feels himself shoved, falling backwards as something wet splatters on his pants.

“Ah, ah, shit, not again.” The breathless groan comes from somewhere in front of him, and Todd opens his eyes to see Icarus panting in front of him, red blossoming on his shoulder. He makes an aborted gesture to help eccentric man, still half in shock from the events of the evening, before a second shot rings out, this time hitting home in the centre of Todd’s chest.

He lets out an unpleasantly wet gurgle as he falls back again with the force of the weapon. Todd can feel himself losing blood, fast, the bullet having nicked a major artery. Forcing himself not to struggle despite all his instincts telling him the opposite, he lets himself relax instead, slowing his breathing to minimize the stabbing pain from his punctured lung.

As his vision pulses in and out, he swears he registers another person pulling themselves up next to him, their laboured breathing giving them away as the still bleeding Icarus. He feels shaking hands press to the wound on his chest, putting hard pressure on the hole that makes his chest feel like it’s going to explode. He groans, struggling feebly to push the hands away.

“No, ah, fuck, not again, _Bart_ , you need to stop doing this, ah, no, shit, he's _important-_ ” The other man’s voice devolves into nonsensical babbling, either because he’s actually speaking through molasses or Todd’s brain has just decided to check out. Really, it’s starting to hurt less now, and Todd almost feels like he’s floating both in and out of his body, dimly aware of the shuddering fingers of the yellow-jacketed man and a soft, steady drip of blood from Icarus’ shoulder as he focuses his attention on futile attempts to stem the flow of blood from Todd’s wound.

Blissfully, he slips away, slowly losing all sensation.

 

Dirk paces like a caged animal in front of Bart, who’s lazily taking apart her sniper rifle. His shoulder has long since healed, the cause of the injury simply being that Bart had caught him by surprise. His eyes are red-rimmed and his hands slightly blood stained, wringing each other in front of him with no sign of stopping.

“Bart, he’s important, I know he is, you need to _stop killing him._ ” Dirk paces, and lets the words stream from his mouth. There’s something about this new one, something important. Dirk has a pull not just in his gut and his right pinky toe, but in his entire body this time. He is _important_.

“Universe says so.” Bart shrugs, her harsh voice stilling Dirk’s frantic movements as though it explains everything. And in a way, it does.

For all their lives, and he supposes their afterlives, the Universe has dictated their every move. And now, now it’s telling them two different things. Dirk says as much, a headache starting to build under his eye.

“Dyin’ ain’t gonna stop him from being important. He can’t die for real anyway.”

Bart is right, Dirk has to admit. But even so, he knows he has to figure out this new man, find what makes him tick. And to do that, he needs Bart to _stop killing him_ every time Dirk even gets close. He's barely had a chance to have half a conversation with the man before he either dies brutally in front of him - and fuck if Dirk isn't tired of watching that, he swears he’s never going to get used to it - or he runs away in fear of said brutal death. Dirk knows he needs to talk to him, though.

He’s _important._ Dirk can feel it.

 

Todd is getting real fucking fed up with death, and he’s only been here a day and a half.

Inevitably, he wakes up again with a gasp, his hands automatically moving to feel at his miraculously and entirely unsurprisingly smooth chest.

He's in the headquarters again, nestled comfortably into the second couch as the voices of the Battlefront mix and meld around him into an unidentifiable mess of language. He forced his eyes open, feeling like someone had taped them closed with lead weights added for good measure.

Hobbs leans over him, concern etched across his face. “That was a rough one, Todd, you okay?”

Todd rubs his chest with a fist, the ghostly feeling of a bullet ripping through his sternum and spine still not fading away quite yet. Hobbs nods like he understands, and everyone falls silent, allowing Ken to take charge and speak.

“Despite... unfortunate injuries,” he nods, mildly sympathetic, at Todd, “Operation: Catastrophe was a success. We secured the desired items with little intervention from Project Whitewing.”

Todd pushes himself unsteadily to his feet at that, pointing a somewhat shaking hand at Ken and ignoring the worried furrow of Hobbs’ brow. “What the hell even was that? What were these so-called 'desired items’?” He pauses, narrowing his eyes as he remembers the way that Icarus and Marzanna seemingly ignored the commotion and the rest of the guards in favour of accosting him specifically.

“I was bait.” He says it quietly, but the entire room is already silent, so it rings out as clearly as if he had shouted.

Farah makes a pained grimace from where she's standing behind her fellow leader. Ken has the gall to shrug. “It was a calculated risk.”

Todd feels his body go hot, all at once, as he flushes with anger. “That wasn't your fucking decision to make.” He clenches a fist at his side, staring Ken in the eyes from across the room. He vaguely feels the people nearby shifting uncomfortably, but he keeps his gaze pinned on Ken.

“I'm in this in its entirety. I may not understand half of this shit, but I'm not in the mood to vanish, so I'm on your side. I will fight, if that's what's necessary. I will be bait, if that's what’s best.” He pauses, letting his fingers unfurl from the half-moon marks they've made in his skin. “But you need to be honest with me. I need to know what's going on. I can't work with you if you're keeping shit from me.”

For a moment he thinks he hears something like an incredulous huff from somewhere in the room, but he can’t manage to pinpoint who it was. When he focuses his attention back on the leaders, he can see Ken nodding his head with something like respect.

“Fine. Good to know.” He pauses, a small smile creeping up his lips. “Now, to answer your question, the desired items from Operation: Catastrophe were these.” He holds up his hand triumphantly, a wad of small papers clenched in his fist. From where he's standing, Todd can see words printed on them, like “FOOD”, “DRINK”, and “BED”.

“Tickets.” Todd is gobsmacked.

Farah pulls one of the tickets labelled “WASH” from the pile on the desk. “Here, we don't _need_ things that you would consider necessities, like food and water. Sure, starving to death sucks,” she grimaces, “but unlike in the real world, it can't actually Obliterate you. And each person is given one of each of these a week. If you want more, you have to be on good behaviour.”

“So you stole them.” It’s not a question, but rather a statement that Todd makes. Farah nods grimly.

“The nature of our operation here is that we don't plan to be Obliterated, so good behaviour is out. Behaviour good enough to live comfortable attracts the Whitewings, and anyone who has a surplus of tickets is bound to vanish soon. So in order for us to do more than survive, we have to do this.” She looks vaguely uncomfortable and places the ticket back on the table, but there's also a determined look in her eyes as she pins Todd with her gaze.

“Personally, I would prefer not to have to steal. But I'm not about to let my friends suffer just because we decided to fight back. That's not how we roll here.”

While she's speaking, Ken had taken the remaining tickets and divided them up equally. He pushes one pile towards each person, and they all take them and then file out the door as the meeting ends. When he hands Todd his, he presses them into his hands a little more firmly than necessary and looks at him sympathetically.

“It’s been two days since you arrived here, and you haven't slept without dying that entire time. Come on, go turn some of those in at the front office and grab some warm food and a soft bed.”

Todd nodded, and somehow found his way to a bedroom on autopilot because the next thing he knew was the feeling of his body stretching and yawning with exhaustion. He could tell that dying here, while essentially forced sleep, wasn't necessarily as restful as its counterpart. He was, to put it lightly, completely and utterly beat.

The bed he flopped onto was relatively comfortable, especially compared to the scratchy hospital cot and lumpy headquarter couch that he'd been subject to in his brief times of being living-impaired.

Unfortunately, the comfort of the bed and the fatigue dragging at his limbs didn't translate to his brain, and Todd was having a hard time shutting off his thoughts. He sighed heavily as they turned to the fiasco of the night before.

_Icarus, or Dirk Gently, whatever his name is._ Todd felt like there had to be something _more_ to him, he couldn't just be this nameless evil, barring the fact that he had multiple names, of course. Unless his own body was lying to him, he could have sworn Icarus helped him both times he had been shot, not to mention putting himself in the way and getting his own shoulder shot by someone who was supposedly a colleague.

But as much as Todd felt something niggling in the back of his mind, telling him that there was something here that was more than meets the eye, he had trouble aligning it with the image of the Whitewings that had been drawn up by the Battlefront. No one stated it outright, but the sombre mood when the conversation came up made it pretty clear that they had lost people to them, had watched as friends and acquaintances had vanished in front of them, all because of Icarus and Marzanna.

It made his head hurt to think about it. He'd been thrown into this with no memory and barely an inkling of who he was, and now he was expected to choose between the good guys and the bad guys? Todd could count the things he knew about himself on one hand. 1. His name is Todd. 2. He thinks honesty is important. 3. He doesn't want to be Obliterated.

That's not a lot. That's not enough for him to say objectively which person is telling the truth and which is manipulating the situation. He's not equipped for this.

But the selfish one, the safest decision, is to stay with the Battlefront.

Todd at least has enough self-preservation to say that.

Its with those troubled thoughts that he finally slips into an uneasy sleep.

  
He's awakened in the half-darkness of dawn by the feeling of thousands of needles impaling his fingers. His mouth is open in a silent scream that he's about to voice, until a sudden, visceral knowledge that he _deserves this, this is justice_ appears in his gut. He gasps with the intensity of it, and even after the pain has long since faded, he can't bring himself to fall back into the comforting arms of unconsciousness.


End file.
